Edmund G. Brown, Jr. (Jerry) Los Angeles Times Pakistan Public Health Social Justice Shorts

Social Justice Shorts

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THE LA TIMES PULLS PLUG ON PRINTING THE NATION’S BIGGEST NON-PROFIT TEEN NEWSPAPER

LA Observed has this story. Kevin and I talked about the issue at the LA Times Festival of Books, and we were both shocked and saddened by the Times’ short-sightedness .

LA Youth is a remarkable project that has been around for two decades, and the LA Times has always helped out by picking up the tab for the printing. Not anymore. Yes, we understand they’re cost-cutting to the bone. But I bet if I looked at a few executive salaries (cough….publisher…cough) I could find the $15 grand it takes to put out this newspaper that has done so much to give LA’s kids a voice.

LA Observed also has ways that you can donate to help out.
(Or click here.)

To give you an idea of what is worth saving, here’s a story by a 15-year-old video journalist who found, through reporting, what in his South LA community really matters.

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ATTORNEY GENERAL JERRY BROWN GOES AFTER THE MAYWOOD POLICE DEPARTMENT


Today, AG Jerry Brown will release a 30-page report
saying that the City of Maywood Police Department “routinely used excessive force, did not obtain probable cause to justify arrests and searches, and operated without adequate oversight by the Maywood City Council and the City’s Chief Administrative Officer.” This report is the result of a 16-month investigation which exposed “gross misconduct and widespread abuse,” including unlawful use of force against civilians.

According to the press release, Brown has sole legal authority under California Civil Code 52.3 to ensure that police departments do not deprive “any person of rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States or by the Constitution or laws of California.”

Okay, Jerry, now that you’re on a roll,
and we’ve discovered you have that “sole legal authority” thingy, how about taking a look at Men’s Central Jail?

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SWINE FLU….AND SWINE-ISH POLITICS

USC sent out a Swine Flu Alert yesterday-–as did, I imagine, a lot of other institutions, even though the number of confirmed cases in the US are still few, located mostly on the East Coast, and thus far there have been no fatalities.

But the CDC is sending out jittery warnings because this is a nasty flu that, in Mexico anyway, has spread uncomfortably quickly out of season.
So caution is appropriate. Thus USC, as the responsible parent, is appropriately telling everyone to be cautious too.

Which brings us around to the political side of this story—namely when certain Republican lawmakers elected not to be appropriately cautious, but to play politics instead by insisting that pandemic preparedness be stripped out of the stimulus package.

My pal Marc Cooper also has a smart take on the issue.

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PAKISTAN’S POOR TURN TO THE TALIBAN AS THEIR GOVERNMENT IGNORES THEM

Fatima Bhutto, niece of the late Benazir Bhutto, has written an excellent and alarming column for the Daily Beast that I hope the right people in the Obama administration manage to read. It says that the biggest cause of the rise of fundamentalism in Pakistan is the government’s failure to provide the simplest of desperately services for the nation’s poor. The Taliban has moved into that vacuum handily with schools, with medical relief and with generators when the government does not even provide electricity.

She writes:

In Pakistan things move at a leisurely South Asian pace. We missed our goals to eradicate polio recently because we, a nuclear nation, could not sustain electricity across the country long enough to refrigerate the vaccines. Garbage disposal is a nonexistent concept, and plush neighborhoods in Karachi boast towers of rubbish piled on street corners and alleyways. Prisons and police cells are full of prisoners awaiting trials, and our justice system, despite the reinstatement of the Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudry, leaves a lot to be desired in terms of meting out free and fair access to justice.

One thing moving ridiculously fast, however, is the Taliban’s stranglehold on the country…..

In a conversation a year and a half ago, Fatima warned me the fundamentalists could gain power if the government continued to neglect its most poverty-stricken citizens. Her views turned out to be prescient.

When Pakistan’s weak and notoriously corrupt president, Asif Zardari, comes to Washington next week to ask for money, Fatima suggests that the U.S. should instead, insist that Mr. Zardari’s government do its job.

31 Comments

  • When you realize an idiot like Susan Collins, who demagoged health money in the stimulus package, is one of the “good Republicans” – because she doesn’t sound like Woody or Glenn Beck every time she opens her mouth – you realize just how worthless and disconnected from reality this crowd has become.

  • THE LA TIMES PULLS PLUG ON PRINTING THE NATION’S BIGGEST NON-PROFIT TEEN NEWSPAPER

    Take out the prefix “non-” and the LA Times would keep it. Students can learn a valuable lesson in economics by making changes that the major papers ignored; i.e., make rather than lose money.

    Their challenge isn’t to get donations but to earn profits. They need donations of business mentoring rather than dollars. I wish them luck.

    – – –

    unlawful use of force against civilians

    Let me guess. The excessive force wasn’t committed against nerdy white guys with pocket protectors. Maybe these policemen are doing their jobs to protect their taxpayers. Still, senior liberals of today are those who used to label police as PIGS, so police work is not appreciated by them.

    – – –

    (House Homeland Security member) Rep. Eric Massa (Democrat-N.Y.) said the border should be closed until the threat is resolved.

    Naturally, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano disagrees, as that would stop illegal immigration into the U.S. of future Obama voters.

    – – –

    Fatima suggests that the U.S. should instead, insist that Mr. Zardari’s government do its job.

    I agree, but cutting off funds isn’t going to help our objective of eliminating terrorists. In the good ol’ days, the CIA would kill foreign leadership that disappointed us. However, the Taliban still has that policy, which gets the attention of those in office.

    Watch what Obama does. I bet that it’s nothing.

  • A stolen comment about the flu:

    Obama secretly tested for swine flu after man he shook hands with in Mexico drops dead the next day. Officials concerned because Obama’s touch usually heals.

  • preparedness should be in budget, not a job stimulus bill.

    There is no stoppng this flu from spreadg to the USA.

  • Hold on to your calzones Woody, Senator Arlen Specter just decided to jump parties.

  • Yes, indeed, perhaps they can shut down that tunnel that runs from Mexico to New Zealand as well. After all, there’s no possible way that anyone other than an Illegal Mexican Immigrant could have spread the Swine Flu.

  • Specter jumped a long time ago. He only made it official in a final gasp of honor to reveal the truth. But, I wonder how much the Democrats promised him personally and how much was provided in Pennsylvania bribes for his re-election to make the change official.

    I’m glad he’s gone. The Republican Party needs to rebuild with people who are loyal to American values rather than what we’re getting from Washington now.

  • Hey, Kevin. There are customs officials covering airport terminals, as well. But, there could still be a tunnel to New Zealand.

  • Your concern for the health of the people of this country is touching, Woody. Or it would be, if your statements weren’t actually motivated by something sick and twisted.

    It’s fascinating how any time Latinos or Mexico are mentioned, you immediately start jabbering about illegal immigrants. You probably lay at night and have dreams about hordes of brown-skinned Typhoid Marys swarming over the country.

  • If you lose your job tomorrow, don’t blame the economy or the fact that your company shipped your job to the Philippines, just blame the damn Mexicans.

  • Remember “Living La Vida Loca” Woody?” what about the f*****g Macarena? I for one cannot go through that again. Those were painful times for all of us. Hold on to your pantalones brother Woody.

  • Carlos: If you lose your job tomorrow, don’t blame the economy….

    …blame the minimum wage increases passed by the Democrats.

  • When someone has you by the short hairs Woody, which is often, your lame response is the old boring posting up of your hysterical calls for all “Mexicans” to be deported. Why not declare all Mexicans as Nazis and solve illegal immigration quickly. Lets not be selective about who is rounded up and who is shipped out. Getting the deportations of illegal immigrants rolling will be an important first step on The Divine Pathway that will carry “our” Christian Nation back onto the Road of Righteousness, not to mention saving our women and children from roaming packs of Mexican rape squads. Yes Woody, you are wise, pragmatic and God-fearing. You understand that the roots of our illegal immigration problem lies in the fertile soil of the inherent lawlessness of colored people. Lets simply charge all illegal Mexican immigrants to be former members of elite units of the Nazi Waffen SS who served as guards at notorious concentration camps and whatnot. That should get the Jewish-Banker-Israeli coalition behind the illegal immigration problem nicely.

  • Woody, you are a racist. You obviously don’t eat much in the way of fruits & veggies that the migrant workers pick, yet you have such xenophobic hate for them.

    It’s no longer the white man’s world.

    Let me quote Fred G. Sanford, “You BIG dummy!”

  • “Specter jumped a long time ago” blah, blah, blah…

    _Today_ “he” pushed Democrats to within one seat of a 60-vote filibuster-resistant majority. Keep your pants on Woody!

  • Some of your knees are jerking so fast that you didn’t read what I wrote. I didn’t say a word about Mexicans.

    Celeste wrote, “Republican lawmakers elected…play politics.” I responded with a media quote, “(House Homeland Security member) Rep. Eric Massa (Democrat-N.Y.) said the border should be closed until the threat is resolved.” Get it?

    You guys are so thin-skinned and have no arguments other than to call people bad names. I guess people who never get past the fifth grade don’t learn to argue except like fifth graders.

  • Lost, Specter jumped to allow the mis-named “Stimulus Bill.” With him, the Democrats already had their filibuster protection. Now, when our country gets royally screwed up by the Democrats, they won’t be able to blame the Republicans. But, I’m sure that they and the lying press will find a way.

  • “The Republican Party needs to rebuild with people who are loyal to American values ”

    Yeah – unfortunately it’s been captured by Hate-America swine who talk shit like secession, bigotry and torture.

  • “I didn’t say a word about Mexicans.”

    That sounds like a looking over your shoulder comment Woody. Lol

  • Once again, reg breaks his promise of not remarking on my comments and brings down the discussion with his unique style of vile language and hate.

    The problem with the Republican Party is that they were becoming too much like low-life Democrats, with one making it official today.

    Democrats do not represent the American values that made America great, and reg makes a backward definition by calling people who are truly patriotic as being “Hate-America swine.” Even the First Lady said that she had never been proud of America.

    Don’t call us anti-American, when all you and your kind do is attack the U.S., and your socialist President goes on his attack America tours in other nations.

  • Fuck you. You and your ilk have dragged my country into the dirt. You’re a racist and a bigot. Secede, asshole ! I’ll pay your ticket to Texas. Good riddance.

  • You’re not fit to shine the First Lady’s shoes. She’s got class. You’re, among other things, a pathological liar and a fool.

  • There is too much vitriol on this blog !!!!!

    Does anyone have any stories about “they’re” abuelita???

    I love abuelita stories wwhich bring tears to our eyes, followed by a smile to our face. I really miss my abuelita’s menudo and chile colorado or was it chile verde, or was it all a figment of my imagination?? Too many ramos ginz fizz and I forget, oh well. RIP abuelita …..

  • Woody
    You need more menudo in your diet amigo. My abuelita can administer a mean Menudo enema if you are interested. I get one evey Sunday morning. Just ask Carlos, we get them together tambien. A la verga.

  • reg: Secede, asshole !

    Why, reg, that’s like someone saying that we should ship all the blacks back to Africa.

    Go ask Don Petronilo above for his enema formula and drink it to clean out your mouth.

  • Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack took pains to repeatedly refer to the flu as the “H1N1 virus.” “This is not a food-borne illness, virus. It is not correct to refer to it as swine flu because really that’s not what this is about,” Vilsack said.

    Could we call it “Montezuma’s Final Solution.”

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